Missed
by Badgergater
Summary: In early season 8, Daniel makes an admission


Missed

Season: Very Early Eight

Author's Note: Thanks to Diana for the beta.

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I was tired, or I would never have let someone sneak up on me like that.

Or so I told myself, refusing to believe that a few weeks behind a desk had already dulled my instincts and turned me from an alert, on-the-edge Black Ops warrior to just another over the hill desk jockey.

Which I wasn't.

Was. Not.

Absolutely. Was. Not.

I mean, just because they replaced my eagles with stars didn't mean they could replace finely honed instincts hard won over years in the field and replace it with a bookkeeper's mindset. That'll never happen to me.

But yes, I was intently jotting down notes in the margin's of SG-7's most recent mission report (a scintillating narrative it was not), and I didn't hear the approaching footsteps until there was a distinctive rhythmic knock on my door.

"So Jack, how's things?" Without waiting for permission, Daniel stepped into my office and flopped into the spare chair, failing to show the slightest iota of respect for the fact that I was now a general and the guy in charge of the whole SGC, not just another chump Colonel. Not that I'd ever been a chump Colonel, mind you, but many Colonels are, especially the Russians. And the Marines. And Maybourne, of course.

"I'm wonderful," I snapped.

"Oooh, that bad?"

I stopped writing and glared at him. "Oh, I suppose it *could* be worse."

"Like?"

"Gee, I don't know. I could be in the infirmary."

Daniel just nodded. "That's never been your favorite place."

"Or I could be retired."

"You tried that already."

"And learned how much fun it wasn't."

"So, then, you're not enjoying being the man?" Daniel borrowed my air quotes motion for the last two words.

Carefully, I set my pen down on my highly polished desk. "Did you think I," I air quoted him back, "would?"

"Actually, no, I didn't."

I had no comeback for that. The room got quiet. I felt glum. Though introspection is something I try diligently to avoid, if I was honest with myself, Daniel was painfully right. I wasn't enjoying being 'the man'; so far it had turned out to be pretty much all of the things I had feared it could be, and none of the things I had hoped it would be- too much paperwork, too much talk, too many politicians, too much worrying, and far too little action.

While I was busy wallowing, Daniel was looking around the office like he'd never seen it before. "I like the way you've changed the place. It's not at all what I would have expected from you. I was thinking camo, or maybe a nice shade of peridot on the walls."

"The peridot's on back order." I snapped and looked pointedly at my watch, "So you came here at nearly midnight to praise my decorating prowess? I've already admitted that I don't have the decorating gene."

"No… no... not really." Daniel paused again. "Um, P4Q-787 was an interesting planet."

Oh right, just the thing I needed to cheer me up, a reminder that my team, er, my former team, still got to go to exciting, off-world places, while I was stuck behind a desk, wielding a pen instead of a P-90. And they cared so much they hadn't even bothered to bring me back so much as a lousy t-shirt. "Lots of pretty rocks there, huh?" I suggested snarkily.

Daniel nodded. "Sam loved it."

"She would. And you?"

"Found half a dozen artifacts that were totally fascinating. I'll be spending weeks and weeks studying them."

"I'll bet," I noted sarcastically.

"And Teal'c, he found the locals fascinating."

"He did?"

"Raised his eyebrow twice in the first ten minutes we were there."

"Wow," I muttered dryly.

"The natives *were* very welcoming, even served us lunch. I think it was sushi."

"Sushi?"

"Or maybe calamari."

I shuddered.

Daniel smiled. "But there was beer."

Ah, Daniel knows me well. "Now *that* would have been worth the trip."

"It was pretty good beer, for alien beer."

"As if you'd know." He is so *not* a connoisseur of finely brewed beer.

Daniel waggled his eyebrows. "The beer was served by beautiful, well-endowed women."

"*That* I would have enjoyed even more."

"Rather scantily-clothed beautiful, well-endowed women, in fact."

Okay, Daniel didn't have to be rubbing salt into unhealed, festering wounds. I missed going off world about as much as the average person would miss breathing. "So the point of you telling me all this- I assume there is a point somewhere- is what? SG-1's post-mission briefing is at 0900 tomorrow," I reminded him pointedly.

"Not everything gets discussed at the briefing." He looked at me over his glasses and sighed. "Jack, the point is that the mission seemed, well, wrong, despite the rocks and the artifacts and the natives and the good food and the beer and the buxom women."

I glared at him. This was *so* not the time for Daniel to be whining about what he still had and what I sorely missed. "The food was tastey, they had Hooters girls for waitresses, and no one was shooting at you - Daniel, what could *possibly* be wrong with a mission like that?"

"There was nobody to crack bad jokes, or give us the play by play on last night's hockey game, or complain about the lack of cake. And absolutely no one mispronounced King Achamachiawoo's name."

"The chief was named Achooachoo?"

He smiled smugly. "Yup. See. I *told* Sam you'd do that."

I took a deep breath and let it out *very* slowly. "Daniel, it's late. I've had a very, very long and very, very frustrating day, and I'm tired of beating around the bush. In fact, I think the bush is quite thoroughly already beaten to death and stomped into the mud. So just say whatever it is you came here to say and be done with it, would you? Time's a'wasten', and I'm not getting any younger. In fact, I can feel my hair getting grayer even as you speak."

"I'm not sure it could get grayer."

I threw him a look that could melt diamonds, and he quit smiling.

"We… well, at least I… just wanted you to know that it wasn't the same."

"*What* wasn't the same?"

"Going offworld. With three people. It's sort of awkward, you know? There's always one of us that has no one to pair up with on the mission."

"And that's the problem? SG-1 gets lonely? You need someone to hold your hand? So you came here to ask me to find you a fourth?"

"No, I'm not asking for a new fourth." He paused. "Jack, it's just *different* now."

"Different how, exactly?" I probed, glaring at him.

"Different different." Daniel was struggling to find the words, which I immediately recognized as Daniel trying not to say whatever it was he was saying. "It's not that Sam isn't a great team leader, because she is, but she has a style that's, just, oh, ah, different than yours."

"I should hope so."

Daniel paused and shook his head. "Okay, I probably shouldn't be telling you this, but, well, Teal'c keeps mentioning it."

"Teal'c is complaining?" I'm sure my eyebrows shot up higher than Teal'c's ever had.

"No, no, not really complaining, just remarking," Daniel backpedaled.

"Well, that's remarkable. Teal'c making comments. He's always been such a chatterbox."

Daniel nodded. "Always. He can't stop talking about it."

"Really?" I asked skeptically.

Daniel nodded some more. "Really, yes. And um, well, maybe Sam mentioned it too, just in an offhand, in passing, kind of thing."

I sat back in my chair. "Reeeaaallly?"

"She agrees. And I do to."

"Agrees to what?" I demanded.

"That ah—"

"Spit it out, Daniel, before you choke on it. Or before I choke you."

"It's that it's just not the same out there when you're not along with us being so — you."

"Me being me?"

"You know, you being- stubborn."

"Determined," I countered.

"Paranoid."

"Vigilant," I corrected.

"Obstructive."

"Cautious," I contradicted.

"Narrow minded."

"Focused," I disagreed.

"Rude and condescending."

"I'm not ru— hey, haven't we had this conversation before?"

Daniel grinned. "Yeah, a long time ago."

A really long time ago, a lifetime ago, when I was still part of SG-1, and we, or at least, Daniel, was still young and naïve and eager to go looking for whatever might be out there in the universe. I sighed, and wished things were not what they were, at least the part that had separated me from my team. "Yeah, well-okay, so I won't win Miss Congeniality, but what does that have to do with the price of China in Teaneck?"

"It's tea in China, and —- and never mind. See. That's what I miss. That, that, you know, that totally off the wall, mangling the English language thing that you do. Among other things, like keeping us all alive — well, okay, I wasn't alive there for a while, and Sam died too though it was you who shot her as I remember, and you've died a couple of times yourself, and we all died way way back that time on the Nox planet and then there was - "

"Daniel!" I snapped, cutting him off.

He stopped, and did that sort of squinty look he does and sighed and said, "Yes, okay, you know." He pushed his glasses up on his nose and continued, very softly. "I will of course, deny I ever said this, but, SG-1 just isn't the same without Jack O'Neill. We miss you out there, all of us do. We don't actually talk about it, but we do notice it- - " His voice drifted to a stop, as though he didn't know what else to say, which doesn't happen to him very often. After a moment of silence, he nodded and added, "I just thought you should know that."

And while I was still trying to think of a suitable, or even an unsuitable, comeback, he pushed himself up out of the chair, sauntered to the door, and without a backward glance, muttered, "Goodnight, Jack," before disappearing out into the hallway.

It was better than any t-shirt. Or even alien beer served by beautiful buxom women. My team hadn't forgotten me. They *missed* me.

Which made it okay for me to miss them.

-The End-

6


End file.
